Interview with a foreign agent

In the aftermath of the United States 2020 elections, As The Disq Turns has managed to secure an interview with a foreign agent who has been running online election interference in the wake of the 2016 elections. To protect the identity of the agent, names, organizations, and places have been changed.

ATDT: Welcome to As the Disq Turns. What may we call you for the purpose of this interview?

FUNN: You may call me Mr Funnel, or just Funn, as my friends call me.

ATDT: How long have you been in the business?

FUNN: I have been active since the fall of the East German Republic, another regime obsessed with walls and authoritarianism.

ATDT: I see. Was this out of political or ideological motivation?

FUNN: Neither really, back then I was renovating my second pied-à-terre in Southern France and the banks weren’t really forthcoming in extending my mortgage. So you get creative with your sources of alternative income.

ATDT: Has this changed over the years or do you still consider yourself a mercenary of sorts?

FUNN: To be honest, I did fancy myself quite the mercenary back in the day, but one matures over the years. That and there is only so much renovation one can do really. So my motivations did start to become more idealistic as I grew older.

ATDT: What brought you to interfere in the 2020 US elections?

FUNN: That was pure spite, plain and simple. See, if you get hired to do a job but your client refuses to pay the invoices you send, action is called for. This particular client had a long history of defrauding companies, his own charities and individuals of their money. Quite honestly I have to admit I should have asked for a deposit, but you live and learn. I didn’t feel a credit recovery service was going to do the job so I had to find another way to recover my losses and make this a teachable moment for my client.

ATDT: Can you give our readers some insight into what your endeavors consisted of?

FUNN: Sure. Typically I will start grass-roots type news organizations, eroding the public trust in said dictatorship. Think of blogs and social media efforts pointing out the fascist nature of the regime in question. Add in some race-relations, religion, and sexuality and you are off to a great start.

ATDT: Does that take a lot of work?

FUNN: Again, not really. With a bit of basic computer knowledge some pocket money from my wife and handful of off-shore coding talent in Asia-Pacific you can set up bot-networks in a matter of days.

ATDT: Is that all you do?

FUNN: We also get substantial funding from philanthropists such as George Soros, which helps recruiting local resources to act as disruptors. And then there is the hardcopy publishing side of my operations.

ATDT: Publishing?

FUNN: Not to toot my own horn, but we printed well over 130,000 ballots this year in Georgia alone and used immigrant volunteers fill those out and deliver them to the ballot boxes, which worked out magnificently, if I say so myself.

ATDT: Aren’t you afraid you are going to get caught?

FUNN: Caught? You must be joking! We are talking about people who organize press events at a suburban garden center next to a dildo shop.

ATDT: What’s next on your radar?

FUNN: Preparations have been going already for a special operation targeting some court in the United States.

ATDT: Sounds exciting! Thanks again for your time Mr Funnel.

FUNN: You’re welcome.

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